Page 362 of Of Empires and Dust

“That right is offeredbeforean attack.” Eltoar circled, his eyes fixed on Salara. She held not a drop of fear in her heart.

“To those with honour,” Salara corrected. “I offer you Alvadrû not because you deserve it, but so that the warriors who march from here, already bloody and broken, may live to see another sunrise. So that they may be spared. Otherwise, I will burn them myself.”

“It doesn’t have to be like this, Salara.”

“It does.” Salara wiped blood from her face, her stare fixing on Eltoar. “We are not in the skies, and you do not sit astride Helios’s back as I had promised, but this will do. A blade in your hand, with nobody here to watch you die. Nobody here to sing any songs of your heroism.”

“Salara, that young dragon – if we can understandhow?—”

“Quiet!” she roared, a sudden rage flaring in her voice. “I will not let you in again. I will not let you twist my mind with your false words. This ends here,Master. Will you accept Alvadrû, or will you fight without honour?”

Eltoar stared back at the elf he had once seen as the closest thing to a daughter he would ever have. He remembered teaching her how to hold a sword, how to fix her belt so it wouldn’t slip, how to play Masari. He had carried her in his arms the first night she’d gotten too drunk. He had held her as she’d wept the first time her heart was broken. He had watched with pride as she’d carried her head high that next day. She had been his greatest joy… she still was.

“Did you see them fall?” Salara asked, not turning her gaze from Eltoar.

Eltoar narrowed his gaze before his pulse quickened.

“The young one ripped open Seleraine’s belly and tore her wing from her body. It was beautiful.” Her words were laced with venom. “To see the first of a new generation tear apart the last of those who betrayed the old. Poetic, don’t you think?”

Eltoar’s jaw clenched, and he tightened his grip on his sword’s hilt. “Heraya take you,” he whispered.

“Heraya? So you do still pray to the true gods. Was it all an act? All just a grab for power? Were you so jealous of Alvira and the love we had for her – so poisoned by Fane’s words – that you saw no other path than to murder her?”

“Do not speak on what you do not know,” Eltoar growled, Helios’s fury burning in him as the dragon kept the others above at bay.

Salara shook her head, fresh blood streaming from her nose. “She loved you, you know? Not just as a companion. She told me one night when we’d drunk too much wine. You remember after the Battle of Alduin’s Place? She didn’t say it in words, not truly, but it was clear in her eyes, in the way she spoke of you, inthetrustshe had in you. She loved you, and you murdered her.” Salara hocked a ball of spit and blood onto the cracked earth. “Karakes fell too.”

Eltoar staggered backwards, the air fleeing his lungs, his throat tightening, and in the sky above Helios let out a heart-wrenching cry.

“I’ve never before found pleasure in someone else’s pain…” She walked towards him, the tip of her blade hovering just above the grass. “How does it feel, Master? To be hunted? To be drawn into a snare and butchered one by one? At least we didn’t do it while you slept. At least we didn’t feign honour, only to set it on fire. Are you all that is left? How does it feel to be alone?”

Eltoar let out a long sigh, his heart cracked and bleeding at the thought of Lyina gone to rest in Achyron’s halls. He hoped Salara was lying, trying to break him, trying to hurt him. But something in her voice told him it was true. “Salara… please…We cannot go on like this.”

Salara only shook her head. “No. You do not know me. I owe you nothing. You made this,” she said, shaking her head. “Eltoar Daethana is dead. You killed him. And I am here to seek vengeance for the death of the master I loved. Uvrín mír, Sainör, nur kanet cianilar hamín.”

Forgive me, mentor, for not coming sooner.

Salara lifted her blade and fell into Howling Wolf. She had always favoured that form.

Eltoar set himself in Patient Wind.

Salara came at him with a rage, her steel blurring as it flashed left and right, pushing Eltoar backwards as she forced him into fellensír simply to keep her blade from opening his throat.

Good movement. Strong. You have grown.Eltoar twisted his back foot in the grass and flicked his blade into reverse grip, using Salara’s momentum and aggression against her. She lunged, and he slipped past, her blade gliding along the strong ofhis with a rasp. He whipped his blade back and brought it down against the backplate of her cuirass.

She stumbled but regained her footing in a heartbeat, pivoting to meet his gaze, fury in her eyes. “Do not treat me like a child. Kill me as you would kill anyone else.”

“Do not let your anger rule you,” Eltoar said, shifting his stance into Striking Dragon. Above, Helios rose through the dark clouds, forcing the others to rise with him. He would not kill any more of his kind than he had to.

Salara drew in sharp breaths, the muscles in her jaw twitching. She charged once more, the fury of svidarya in her movements. The burning winds had always been a part of her, harnessing the rage in her heart. But her lack of control had held her back. That was no longer the case.

Eltoar parried her first strike at his neck by shifting into Rising Dawn, then swept his blade across and took the full force of her downward swing.

Salara leaned in, her face inches from his. “Stop holding back. You were Alvira’s First Sword. The greatest swordsman in all Epheria. Tell me, ghost, was she surprised when you turned that same sword on her? Or did she see it coming?”

Eltoar threw his weight forwards and pushed Salara from him, holding down the rage that bubbled within and setting himself into Tenp i’il Uê.Stone in the Water.

Salara swung at his side, and as he turned the blade away, she smashed her elbow into his cheek with acrunch.

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